online
poker games is a generic name for literally hundreds
of games, but they all fall within a few interrelated
types. There are high games like seven-card stud and
Texas hold 'em, in which the highest hand in the showdown
wins, and low games like draw lowball and razz, in
which the lowest hand wins. There are also high-low
split games, in which the best high hand and the best
low hand split the pot. Among high, low, and high-low
split games there are those like five-card draw, in
which the hands are closed, and those like seven-card
stud, in which some of the players' cards are exposed
for all to see.

Jokers, wild cards,
and special rules may be introduced into any of these
games to create such aberrations as Baseball, Follow
the Queen, Anaconda, and scores of other variations
that have spiced up home online poker games for decades.
Paradoxically, the two types of players who favor
these exotic online poker games variations are generally
amateurs who want a lot of action and hustlers who
prey on these amateurs because their long experience
allows them to adjust more easily to unusual games
than their amateur opponents can. However, before
a player can become an expert at exotic games, he
must understand the basic concepts of standard games.

In
Parry Poker. com's lobby, you can see how many different
games are currently running at each stake level, how
many players are seated in each game, how long each
waiting list is, the average pot size, and the average
number of hands played per hour. By analyzing this
information, you may decide that one particular table
at a given stake level is much more promising than
another.

Waiting lists work a bit differently on the Internet
than they do in casinos. When you visit an Internet
"lobby," you can go directly to any table
that has an open seat, but if there are no seats currently
open at the stake level you wish to play, you can
join waiting lists in one of two ways:

- You can join a "global" waiting list where
you agree to take the first open seat in any game
at your desired stake level, as long as that game
has a certain minimum number of players at the table
(the minimum to be decided by you).
- You can join several individual waiting lists. Although
this process is more time consuming, it is the better
way to go. If you join a global wait list, as soon
as you get taken to a table with an open seat, your
name comes off the waiting list for all the other
tables at that stake level.